Cross-border governance in Asia

In Cross-border governance in Asia: regional issues and mechanisms, a timely collection of scholars on the study of cross-border governance in Asia, gives well-researched answers to these questions through four levels: “institutions”, “policies”, “laws and equity”, “civil society and media” (p.6). This collection is divided into seven chapters. In chapter 1, the introduction of this book, Cheema illustrates the research purposes and outline of the book. From chapter 2 to 6, the contributors examine migration, epidemic diseases, water crisis, trade environment and human trafficking in Asia.

In chapter 2, Hugo discusses the dynamics of migration in Asia and the Pacific, analyzes some of the most critical issues related to migration in this region, and evaluates the existing regimes of governing migration at both transnational and national levels. As Hugo observes, there is a growth of high-skilled migrants from OECD countries in Asia. At the same time, Asia is also the origin and destination of low-skilled migrants. However, it’s worth noting that temporary migration from Asia to the rapidly growing economies has increased particularly, and student migration out of Asian countries has also been increasing. Concerning the emerging issues on migration in Asia, as Hugo comments, diaspora in this region would make great contributions to the home states, such as “more reliable and larger source of development funds”, “direct source of FDI”(p.43) and bridgehead of economic development. At the same time, there is still a series of issues related with protection of the rights of migrants (e.g., female migrants, undocumented migration and stigma toward migrants). With regard to the countermeasures, in Hugo’s opinion, it’s necessary to improve governance in both destination countries and origin countries, and one of the most essential prerequisites should be “conceptual leap”, that is, “migration is a structural element in local economies and that it will remain so in the long term” (p.69).

Next, in Chapter 3, based on the case of the Mekong Basin Disease Surveillance Network (MBDS), which is an exception of trans-border governance, Long explores the dynamics of managing epidemic diseases in the Mekong Basin. As Long concludes, the MBDS member states “recognize and act on their enlightened self-interest” (p.109) to maintain the cross-border governance in epidemic diseases. However, this kind of initiative faces its own limitations, for example, the polarity of actors would probably cause “obvious problems of coordination and efficiency” (p.115).

As another important issue in discussion of this collection, water crisis and the relevant governance framework are analyzed in Chapter 4. As Douglass argues, there are three major water crisis in Asia--the Mekong River Basin, the Indus River Basin and the Central Asia, which have some triggering factors in common, such as urbanization, infrastructure projects, privatization of water regimes and climate change. At present, though the water crisis does not trigger large-scale armed conflicts, there have been a series of potential or serious barriers, for example, most existing cross-border governance in water crisis are still reactive, and keep “multilateral in spirit” (p.156). As regards to the countermeasures, one of the most attractive ones might be locally oriented decision-making and raising public awareness in water crisis.

In Chapter 5, Bark briefly illustrates the current situations of trade environment in Asia, especially Southeast Asia and East Asia, and the corresponding regional institutional arrangements. Following from Bark's argument, civil society and media should play essential roles in improving trade environment. However, in the case of Korea, the NGOs and media are influenced by political interests or group thinking to some extent, which produces an uncertain environment for coordinating different discourses, even radicalize public opinions in some cases.

Chapter 6 reviews the dynamics of human trafficking in Asia, then explores the relevant policy responses, challenges and countermeasures. As Anthony claims, the most critical feature of existing human trafficking in Asia is “growing feminization of migration” (p.229). However, both the formal and informal institutional arrangements are in their initial stage, which could not fully address individual needs of the human trafficking victims, let alone the marginalized women vulnerable to human trafficking. Therefore, Anthony cherishes high hopes for civil society organizations (CSOs) and NGOs in Asia to play key roles in preventing human trafficking. She not merely explains the current situation of CSOs and NGOs, but also provides a useful list of these organizations, which are active in resolving human trafficking in Asia.

In Chapter 7, McNally combines his analysis with the findings in the former chapters. As McNally concludes, the current cross-border issues in Asia present four most obvious trends, that is, growing intensification, contextualization of governance, polarity of actors and “conceptual clouds” (p.278). For resolving the cross-border issues in the long run, McNally provides several policy recommendations: first, countermeasures should be contextualized to corresponding issue; second, useful and reliable informations should be shared among all the stakeholders; third, legal frameworks should contain all the stakeholders, especially civil society organizations and media; fourth, political compromises and commitments should be reached.

In summary, Cross-border governance in Asia: regional issues and mechanisms fills the gap between the practices and researches of cross-border issues inAsia. At the same time, this collection also provide useful in-sights for managing other cross-border issues in Asia, such as child soldering and drug smuggling, which are not addressed in this collection. This collection should be of interest to academics, scholars, students, policy makers and activists who are looking for an in-depth analysis of cross-border issues inAsia.

Kai Chen, Zhejiang University, China (chenkai@zju.edu.cn)